Wednesday, January 28, 2009

Gill's Blog Post

Ho hum. We will just have to try to ensure that Mr Badman is quite clear that parents, yes PARENTS should be responsible for the education and welfare of their children, that the state only has a duty to intervene where it is clear that parents are failing in their duties, and that the law must respect this balance.

It'd be career suicide for him, though, to do anything other than report as expected. I wonder if he'd have the courage to do it anyway. If he's a man of real integrity, he'll report as he actually finds.

It will surely be difficult for him to approach it with an open mind though, with a history like that.

"the word duty implies compulsion. A duty is a moral obligation to an authority, absent of self-interest and imposed by force."

Ah right, I see your argument, although I disagree that these are necessary implications of the word duty.

I impose duties upon myself because they are the reasonable thing to do, and therefore I want to do them and I impose them upon myself completely freely. I am my own authority, and some duties I make certain I meet are definitely within my own range of self interest. eg: I owe a duty of care to myself...to eat, go out meet friends etc.

I don't think this is too unusual a use of the word duty, and imagine that others could read it that way.

I wonder if a similar Portuguese word has the stricter connotations you suggest?

I would say that a duty is an obligation imposed by one's conscience. It is only "imposed" by moral authority not by the authority of a person or body; it is an act that one considers essential to undertake in order to maintain one's integrity.

Unless you precede the word with another that alters context and meaning eg "legal duty".